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FireAngel8723
Author of 4 Stories |
Disclaimer: I don’t own HP or anything else mentioned in the HP universe. I only own what you don’t recognize, including original characters and the plotline. So don’t sue…and don’t steal:-)
Edit 12/14/05: There will be no major HBP spoilers in this story. It was started before HBP was released, and I want to stay on track with what I want to do with the story, instead of going back and re-working my entire working outline. Occasionally, I may work in a small element from HBP, but you’ll be warned beforehand, I promise!
Edit 12/28/06: As I’ve been going back over what I have written for this story, I’ve noticed a few errors and inconsistencies. I’ve replaced the chapters with the corrections. I also decided to stop using song lyrics, since I started having a hard time finding lyrics that matched the chapters. Therefore, the song lyrics in front of each chapter have been deleted.
“Happy birthday, Harry,” he whispered to himself as he waited for his customary midnight owls from his friends.
It was his own little tradition…as the clock announced the change to his birthday, Harry would wish himself a happy birthday, because he knew he would never hear the words from his family, the Dursleys. Then he would sit in the desk chair that was situated by the window to wait for his friends’ and surrogate family’s birthday presents, sent in the dead of night so the Dursleys’ wouldn’t see and confiscate them.
As he glimpsed his own snowy owl, Hedwig, approaching the window, he smiled slightly and opened it to let her glide silently in. After depositing the parcel she carried on the desk, she gave Harry an affectionate nip on the ear and settled into her cage to sleep. Not far behind the arrival of Hedwig were Pig, Ron’s owl, Errol, the Weasley family owl, and a large brown barn owl from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
As Harry opened his gifts carefully and quietly, he grinned. It was nice to have friends who cared enough about you to send you presents. Hagrid had sent the customary rock cakes and the new course book for Care of Magical Creatures. ‘Ah. Dumbledore’s finally made him get a tame book, at least,’ Harry thought laughingly as he put the very normal-looking book aside. Hagrid, the Care of Magical Creatures professor at Hogwarts, was infamous for assigning biting, snapping, and even fire-spitting books for his classes.
Ron and Ginny had pooled together to get Harry refills for his broomstick servicing kit and a subscription to Quidditch Weekly. They had included a note…
Hey Harry-
Hope the muggles are treating you alright. You will tell the Order if they aren’t, right? Mum and Dad are trying to get Dumbledore to let you come to the Burrow for a while sometime this summer, but he doesn’t seem to be having any of it. Maybe if we were all at Headquarters…
Anyway, if we don’t see you this summer, we’ll definitely see you on the Hogwarts Express! We can’t wait to get back to school…Percy’s apologized for his awful behavior and is back living at home, and he’s driving everyone up the wall…well, everyone but Mum and Dad, at least.
Have you gotten your present from Hagrid yet? We’re glad it doesn’t do anything but behave like a book…maybe Dumbledore’s finally said something to him about his interesting choices in books.
Anyway, have a good birthday, mate, and we’ll see you soon.
--Ron and Ginny
From Hermione, Harry had gotten a book (‘No surprises there,’ Harry thought, snorting quietly in laughter.) about various defensive charms and other spells. She, too, had included a note, saying much the same thing as Ron and Ginny’s. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had sent an assortment of sweets and a note asking if he was okay and asking if the muggles were behaving themselves.
Harry wrote back to everyone, saying thank you for the gifts and reassuring them that yes, he was fine and yes, the muggles were treating him okay. After the owls departed, Harry took up his chair at the window once again, feeling somehow that he shouldn’t be happy about getting presents and correspondence from his friends, not after Sirius had died.
‘Sirius…’ Since the Department of Mysteries, Harry had not been able to think of his late godfather without becoming very, very depressed…and tonight was no exception. ‘God, if I had trained harder at Occlumency…if I hadn’t fallen asleep…if Snape had tried a little harder…if…’ Harry’s train of thought was interrupted, however, when movement in the backyard below caught his eye.
Harry looked down curiously, sure he had seen a shadow move near the Dursley’s rosebushes…but after a few moments of peering down into the yard, Harry shrugged off the feeling of being watched and his stare became vacant again. In a few minutes, however, another movement in the backyard brought him out of his reverie. This time, Harry looked down quickly enough to catch the shape of a person…an adult, by the looks of things…darting around the corner of the house.
Harry sighed deeply and took his wand from its hiding place under the floorboards. ‘Well, there’s nothing for it. I only hope whoever’s down there’s not too dangerous,’ he thought as he silently made his way downstairs and out into the backyard. Leaves and dry grass crunched under Harry’s feet as he crept around the side of the house, his wand held rigidly in front of him. When he saw no one on the side of the house, he relaxed slightly and turned to go back into the house, convinced his imagination had just run away from him.
Then he stumbled backward as a silent spell hit him in the chest. The last thing he saw before he completely blacked out was two glowing red eyes floating above him.
Carefully, he crouched down behind some hideous-looking rosebushes to wait. A quick look at the muggle watch on his wrist told him it was only 11:30 at night. A little over half an hour to wait…after all, Harry needed to be 16 first…something about him needing to be in the home of blood relatives on his birthday every year. He wasn’t completely sure…he had tuned Dumbledore out by then, since he had already been told what he had needed to know.
Speaking of Dumbledore…he really was having doubts about this mission. Harry was so young…what if something went wrong? Turnings were risky even with people who had already grown into their bodies and powers…but with a boy who was still growing both physically and magically? The risks could only be much greater. But everyone seemed to trust Dumbledore, even if they hadn’t exactly liked the idea. That red-haired woman, especially, was against any harm that might come to Harry, even for the greater good.
The man hidden in shadows checked his watch again, then glanced up at the cloudless sky to watch a snowy owl glide like a ghost through Harry’s window, followed soon by three more owls. ‘A few more minutes,’ he thought, shifting slightly in anticipation.
When he saw Harry back at the window, he moved back around the side of the house, making sure to draw slight attention to himself. As Dumbledore had predicted, Harry looked down sharply and then disappeared from the window, reappearing moments later in the doorway to the backyard. He smiled slightly when he saw Harry’s wand held tightly in front of him. ‘At least he’s prepared,’ he thought. Then he saw the wand tip drop slightly when Harry relaxed. ‘Too soon, Harry. Never relax that fast. Must make a note of that…we’ll fix that in training.’
After that thought, the man sent a silent, wandless spell at Harry and watched as it hit the boy in the chest and knocked the wind out of him. Before Harry could hit the hard ground, the man was there, carefully lowering him so that he didn’t get hurt. His red eyes ran over the boy’s pale features and baggy clothing. ‘What on earth? This slip of a boy has that strong a magical signature?’ The man’s blood-red eyes registered his surprise as a few of his doubts were resolved. ‘But still…he’s so young. He’ll not be happy about this, I don’t think, but I do see the need. There is no way he can defeat Voldemort like this, although he has more magical power than anyone I’ve ever come into contact with, even Dumbledore.’
With a glance at the silent house, the man opened his mouth and let his fangs lengthen in preparation for what he was about to do. His last thought as he bent his head and let his fangs sink into Harry Potter’s neck was, ‘I really hope I’m doing the right thing here.’
In the kitchen of Number 12, Grimmauld Place, Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts and leader of the Order of the Phoenix, waited for his newest inductee into the Order to return from his mission.
Donovan Parris was really an invaluable person and would help the Order greatly in their quest to see the defeat of Voldemort…and what he was doing right now was perhaps the most important thing any member of the Order would do in the fight against Voldemort, aside from Severus, who risked his life every time his Mark burned to bring valuable information back to the Light Side.
Speaking of risking lives…Albus hoped Harry would be okay. This new plan was the best and, really, the only way to boost Harry’s natural magical power levels enough to make him a formidable opponent for Voldemort. But the risks were…unspeakable. Turning was risky even with a full-grown wizard, but with Harry, who was still growing…well, Albus didn’t want to think about what would happen if something went wrong. Harry was a strong boy, physically, mentally, and magically, and Albus was almost certain he’d pull through. But this waiting for Donovan to bring Harry back to Headquarters was terrible…
After he made sure Harry was okay, he’d have to tell Remus of what happened, since the werewolf was away from the country on a mission when the Order decided on the current plan of action. Remus wouldn’t be pleased at all…but he’d have to get used to it, because it was the only way. Still, though, Albus was not looking forward to explaining to a tired werewolf who happened to be Harry’s surrogate godfather that his godson was now a Vampire. Albus didn’t imagine it would go over well at all, but…he hoped Remus would understand the reasoning behind it, at least.
Albus sighed and shifted on his chair. A quick glance at his watch told him it was nearly one in the morning…’Donovan should be arriving with Harry at any time.’ As soon as that thought was completed, Albus heard the front door open and Mrs. Black start screaming. ‘Thank Merlin no one else is here right now,’ he thought, shaking his head as he made his way up to the entryway.
Donovan stood at the foot of the stairs with an unconscious Harry in his arms. There were bloodstains around both mouths and Harry looked pale…almost unnaturally pale. “Albus. There were no problems, but I’m worried. His magical strength…it could take a bit longer than expected for him to wake. I’ve never felt anything like it,” Donovan said over Mrs. Black’s shrieks. He waited until Albus had tugged the curtains back into place before speaking again. “Did you know…he’s the strongest person, magically speaking, that I’ve ever met?”
Albus’ eyebrows shot up in surprise as he looked down at the pale, skinny form in Donovan’s arms. ‘Well, well Harry…you’re just full of surprises, aren’t you?’ “I had no idea, Donovan. Let’s get him upstairs and settled in, then we can talk more,” Albus said. Albus followed Donovan up the stairs and helped him tuck Harry into a bed in a little-used room of the house.
“Albus, if you’d take care of the curtains…the moonlight will hurt when he wakes,” Donovan murmured, leaning over Harry and doing something Albus couldn’t see.
The older man spelled the curtains shut, then turned to watch Donovan as he let his fangs elongate. Donovan carefully bit into his own wrist with his razor-sharp teeth, then forced Harry’s mouth open and let the blood drip down the boy’s throat. ‘Fascinating,’ Albus thought as Harry’s body twitched and his mouth latched onto Donovan’s wrist. After a bit of time, Donovan pulled away, licked the wound on his wrist to close it, and wiped the blood away from Harry’s mouth.
“It should be safe to enervate him now, Albus,” Donovan said quietly, stepping away from the bed.
Albus stepped forward and rested the tip of his wand against Harry’s temple. “Enervate,” he said quietly, but clearly. Harry just sighed and shifted away from the wand tip. A furrow appeared between Albus’s brows as he tried the spell twice more, with no results. “What’s going on, Donovan?”
Donovan sighed and ran elegant fingers through his black hair. “I told you…his magic was so strong before that it may take longer for him to wake. His body must get used to the new power flowing through it and his magic, because it’s so strong, will take longer to merge with the Vampire’s power,” he explained. “The only thing to do, since the Enervate spell isn’t working, is wait. He should be awake by morning, but he’ll be in pain. I shall monitor him, because I believe you have a visitor in the kitchen…a visitor who is not pleased at the presence of two Vampires in the house.”
With a small smile, Albus realized Donovan must have sensed Remus arriving. “Thank you. Please notify me when Harry wakes up,” he said before he swept out of the room and back downstairs.
He entered the kitchen to find Remus, nose in the air and arms crossed, sniffing. “Albus, what is going on? There are Vampires here,” he said, looking at the older man.
“Yes, my boy, there are,” Albus replied. He conjured a teapot. “Perhaps you’d better sit down as I explain the latest developments to you. Tea?”
As the two sat down, Albus took a deep mental breath to prepare to fill the werewolf in on all that had happened in his absence.
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